Doug Benson on the Record

Doug Benson’s work on King Oliver and Wolverines material quickly became benchmarks for what proper audio restoration could reveal. Since those discs in 2007 and 2012 his name on an album has been enough to convince people in the know to trade up for what is destined to become the definitive version, even if they already own all of the underlying material. He’s now worked on a number of releases of acoustic and early electric era recordings, many of which I've enjoyed without realizing they were the result of his magic. Our interview includes fresh word of recent, upcoming, and potential must have albums. Joe Bebco: How did the King Oliver set come about? ​ Doug Benson: As a fan of early jazz, I had been listening to those sides since I was a boy, and yet still never felt I had really "heard" them. Existing reissues were mostly cobbled together from previous reissues (meaning dubs of dubs) and the music always sounded far off and muffled. One fantastic exception was the 1974 Herwin LP with all the Gennett material freshly transferred, and not filtered at all. Despite the scratches, the clarity of the music was revelatory to me. I began wondering if all the Oliver's (Gennett, OKeh, Columbia, Paramount) could be accessed and reissued in a similar way. Improved technology allowed removal of a certain amount of noise without affecting the music. Once my lifelong friend Da